Burning Ambition
by MuckyShroom
Summary: Through the Eyes of Another challenge. It itches and burns. It smoulders and consumes. It owns you until you will find any way to extinguish the blaze, even if that means feeding it.


**_All characters, etc from Sons of Anarchy belong to Kurt Sutter._**

**Burning Ambition**

He watched them with fury and frustration tangling their green-tinted fingers around his psyche. The smoky tendrils of emerald-hued envy were waving themselves into the very fibres of his heart and his brain, into his very soul until he was virtually unable to think; until he was almost choking on the bile of his growing ire.

That hang dog expression, the brown eyes darting around like a puppy that had been kicked too many times and expected abuse at every turn made him want to plant his be-ringed fist in the middle of that anxious face. That face had once held only vitality, strength, courage, pride. Those eyes had once glinted with emotion, with the promise of freedom. That had been what had lured them all together. They'd all seen it, been drawn in like moths to the flickering flame of the ideals promised within. Those smouldering sparks had been fanned into a roaring blaze known as the Sons of Anarchy MC Redwood Original.

That inferno had become Clay's life, his family, his only purpose. Now he watched what was left of John, a man broken by the death of his youngest son, Thomas. This ghost had been their dauntless leader, a man who had survived the horrors of the carnage in Vietnam with not just his sanity intact but with a vision, an ideal of what the world could be and an iron will to mould it in the image he desired and the inner strength to gather men who would follow him, who would knead the clay of reality until it resembled the form they wished it to take. That man had no fight left in him now. He was empty of everything, empty of care, empty of love. He was a mere phantom, shadowing the life that he used to live. He was spending more and more time away from the club in Ireland and the lack of leadership was making the other members nervous. The fragile atmosphere was not good for the brotherhood. The deal that was being brokered for the sons to mule guns via the new charter John was setting up in Belfast was beyond the scope of many of their collective experiences, but it would give them a living, keep that roaring blaze well-fed and alive: But a firm hand was needed on the rudder, not the weak, pallid, wasted fingers of what was left of John Teller.

Clay couldn't understand how Gemma could bear to be around John. She was so young, so vibrant, so strong, so ripe. She was everything that John had been in the beginning. She had borne and birthed two children with that potency and certainty only women possessed to undertake such a task. She had coped with the news of Jackson having inherited the family flaw with her back straight and her head high, never letting the news bow her shoulders. The weight of Thomas' death hadn't broken her as it had her husband. She had been forged in the furnace of that suffering and emerged as a deadly blade, strong and true. She was a queen, a goddess; ready to fight for her family, to draw blood, to kill to keep what she had safe. He could see that in her and it made his heart swell with pride and something else that he didn't wish to name ...not yet. He was in awe of her. He wanted to kneel and worship at the alter of her strength and draw some of that blessing into himself. He could see with crystal clarity where this club was meant to go, what it was meant to be. He knew what needed to be done to fulfil its potential and he knew, just knew, right in the marrow of his bones, within the nuclei of his cells, that he was capable of steering them on a true course. He knew just as deeply, that with Gemma by his side, sharing the vision, driving him on, supporting him, that they would be unstoppable, a power to be reckoned with.

John and Gemma had been the sun around which he'd orbited for so long: The King and Queen of his life. Now he would be the Mark Antony to their Caesar and Cleopatra. His steely blue gaze sought hers for a moment. Those dark orbs seemed to see right into his soul, laid bare his secrets, his intentions, his desires. Right then he felt as though he were standing in front of her as nothing so much as flesh and bone and throbbing blood; the very essence of the man he was. He felt the charge between them, felt the electricity pulse over his skin, into him. He felt his body react to her and knew, spiritually, physically that she was meant for him. It was destiny: And judging by the small knowing smile that she gave him, she knew it too.


End file.
